


Reversing blackout

by tsukiakari



Series: Insomnia [3]
Category: Nancy Drew (Video Games), Nancy Drew – HER Interactive (Video Games)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-09
Updated: 2013-09-09
Packaged: 2017-12-26 02:19:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/960414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tsukiakari/pseuds/tsukiakari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wade goes on a trip to see Savannah, for the first time in years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reversing blackout

He's always found it a mixture of odd and fitting, the fact that she lives in Athens rather than in Savannah. From all he's heard, awkwardly listening to the details of her life as he does, she's spent more time away from the city than in it, driving around some battered car. Somehow, he can't wonder if she'll be on the road when he arrives.

His own car's rattling a bit, as usual - even through the haze of expectation and irrational nervousness he can hear the wheels rumbling, and something somewhere has been shrieking every time he turns the wheel. Interstate 16's dim brown contours blur past the windshield, every mile looking the same as the last. From the ache in his arms and shoulders, it feels like he's been driving for years.

Risking a glance off the road, he taps the power button on his radio and the driver's side speaker sets to its angry crackling instantly. A lane over, a cluster of passing cars flash by, engines roaring, shaking some life into his thoughts. For an instant, he feels as though he's just awakened from a dream full of glaring sun and lukewarm air, and then reality settles into his mind again, with a knowing grin.

The radio starts blasting bluegrass through its remaining speakers, stinging his ears. He turns the volume down, letting the music settle into a muffled wail under the dead speaker's constant crackle, and his thoughts start creeping back to her as though lured by a magnet. The thought of her waiting is everything that's keeping him on the road - he'd gotten out of Brunswick as soon as he'd eaten some semblance of lunch, leaving Harper to gloat over Thornton Hall's demise, forcing his car through the noonday heat until he'd almost hit the border. Two hours later, and I-16 is still crawling by, and the air conditioner pump's starting to wheeze.

When he lets himself really think about what he's doing, doubt hits him for a moment, the same unsubtle punch in the gut that he remembers so well from years ago. Five or six hours of driving is all well and good, but the idea of her locking her doors and leaving town the moment he arrives sparks sick worry in him. More than anything, she's always been stubborn, whether it was a side effect of being raised by her father or just the colors of her own personality. For all that he wants to see her face, he dreads driving her away again.

He justifies it to himself, or tries to, reasoning that he'd have had to face their relationship at some point. She'd invited him, even if her voice had held the weight of uncertainty and nervousness when she'd spoken the words. Getting the air cleared between them, working out what had happened before, reconciling the past with the future - it's all he wants to do, even though thinking about it makes the inevitable hopelessness drift in.

The road signs start to change, heralding the approach of Forsyth. He remembers the route change ahead, the plans sifting dully through the distracting haze in his mind, and squints to focus on the sun-bleached highway. The air conditioner is all but groaning now, pushing out weak spurts of cool air along with a copious amount of heat. He flicks the switch off with one hand just to save the engine the trouble. Instantly the atmosphere thickens, humidity swirling through the vents, starting to brush sweat across his face.

Forsyth's exit is a gentle west turn sloping down a hill, and his car shrieks banshee-like the entire way. He finds himself sighing unconsciously, as the sun retreats behind. Some minutes later Forsyth's gone and Route 83 stretches inexorably out before him, another expanse of concrete rimmed by trees. This time the sight is more depressing than encouraging.

A few miles down the road, his car's wheezing and the crackle of the radio start wearing on his nerves, grinding away what little patience he's got left. Aggravation makes him pull onto the overgrown grassy shoulder and hit the brakes, which naturally shudder through the car like a small earthquake. "I should've had this heap of junk repaired," he mutters, grinning despite himself at the immortal irony of talking to no one.

He manages to heave the car door open and hurry around to the other side before a huge supermarket truck barrels by. The air's barely cooler than inside the car, but a slight breeze sweeps down the open road, and the vague sensation of freedom makes him relax. Taking his jacket off, he tosses it onto the back seat.

On a whim he looks up into the sky, searching for clouds and finding none in the deep blue. The loneliness of his situation slips into his thoughts, tainting them with the same odd joy he'd felt years ago, driving up to the city in another ancient car to meet with his friends. Freedom has always seemed like something both possible and impossible - impossible when old Jackson Thornton shouted at him, impossible when he'd seen the padlock on the factory door, even more impossible when the jail cell had closed behind him, but yet still possible the entire time. When he'd fled from Jackson's anger for the first time, driving under flickering midnight stars, he'd listened to every rumble of the engine like the most beautiful symphony. When he'd met Savannah, he'd seen for the first time the possibility of some real life outside his family, and the memory of it makes him smile even now. When he'd gotten out of jail, he'd traveled as far as he could in one day and almost wept just for the idea of being free again. All of it, good and bad, comes back to him again.

"Come on, now, calm down," he tells himself, shaking the memories out of his head. "Save it for later, at least."

Getting back into the car is more difficult than he'd expected, but he forces his thoughts back to his destination, and keeps the radio turned off this time. The miles creep by, the same surroundings broken only by the occasional overpass or lonely exit curving around a corner. Eventually he rolls down the windows for some relief from the claustrophobic heat, letting the air come blasting in at 75 miles an hour, but it barely helps.

Monticello goes by, deeper forests coating the road's two lanes with occasional shade from their bare boughs. Miles later the forests thin out into slender trunks, and autumn somehow seems to be following along, making him nervous but oddly calm at the same time. He ends up glancing from side to side at the flanking trees, against his will.

After an hour on Route 83, the sun is starting to creep over the horizon, winking across vast fields and through the driver's side windows like a watching eye. He weaves his way through little Madison, ignoring his surroundings by this point, the bunker-like '50s-era houses turning into brick-colored blurs. Then the final leg of his trip comes, heralded by a cluster of stop lights, and he turns onto the Athens Highway with another sickening screech from the steering wheel.

The highway would give him deja vu, with its overhanging branches and tight two lanes, if he wasn't already trying to keep his stomach out of nervous knots. Every mile brings him closer to her - no amount of open fields filled with browning grass, no amount of solitary trees stretching naked branches to a sky that's frosted in faint clouds, no amount of speed or lack thereof will change that now. By the time the road widens into four lanes, he's fighting the urge to grit his teeth out of worry.

When he reaches Athens, anticipation sweeps the cobwebs out of his thoughts permanently. He finds himself sitting nearly on the edge of his seat, holding the steering wheel carefully in both hands, and it trembles under his fingers as he turns corners and brakes at stop signs. Her address echoes in his head, the words softened by her accent. It seems like a tense eternity of waiting to find the right road, the right turning, the right house with the right number.

Finally, around a sweetly anticlimactic corner, he sees what she'd described - a small cottage from perhaps the '60s, swathed in faded white clapboard siding and topped with a dull grey roof. The driveway is empty, and the little garage door stands closed and locked.

Even as he pulls into the driveway and turns the key in the ignition, letting his car whimper into a creaky silence, the stubborn doubts whisper to him. For an instant, he truly isn't sure what he would do if she was gone.

"You said you'd be here." He stares at the wry orange front door, nearly wishing he could see through it. "You better be here."

The air is cooler, crackling with premonitions of the approaching evening. His body feels angrily sore from the trip, and he nearly trips over a slight slope in the driveway. Despite a faint breeze, the neighborhood is quiet, no cars driving by and no voices heard. His knock on the door thuds heavily, resounding on the hollow metal.

In the moment of complete silence, he finally understands how a scared rabbit feels, with its eyes wide and its every sense on alert, weighing the decision to panic or to stay still and utterly quiet. It's as though he's young again, stupid enough to let his emotions rule everything else.

Then, she opens the door.


End file.
